Hello,My name is Bart Heemskerk and i live in the Netherlands. Proud owner of a 1981 murena 1.6. I have used this car for years to go to work. And i allways was a bit dissapointed about the power. So 4 years ago i started an engine conversion. A peugeot 1900 8V. I thought i would do the job in a few weeks, but hel, i was wrong. I haven't been so wrong in my live. 3/4 of a year it was before the first ride was. And after that still 100 things to improve.

During this conversion i needed an other car, because the mur was my daily driver. At a scrapyard i came across a mazda rx-7 from 1983. It had dents allover, 1 headlight was up and 1 headlihgt was down, but it had 1 year apk (mot) . So that became my temporarely daily driver. And fel in love with it. Not so much on the car, but more on the engine. And what an engine. An 1.1 liter wankel engine. And what a sound and what a power and what a smooth smoothynes!

So lateron the murena 1900 engine was fitted but i was a bit dissapointed with the result. Yes, it was a lot better then the original 1600, but compared with the mazda......

The mazda is now back on the srapyard, but without the enine. Guess where the engine is now...

Mazda only mounted this engine longitudinal (is that the right word?). But i want to mount is transversal. Mazda doesn't have a transversakl gearbox to match this engine, so i had to make my own. Unfortunatly i couldn't use a murena gearbox, or the peugeot 1900 gearbox or even a citroen cx box. The flywheel of the rotary engine is simply too big to fit in these gearboxes. A toyota celica was the best option. Made an adapterplate to fit the gearbox to the engine, made engine mounts which meet the original chassis mounts. (no welding or grinding on my car!)

The car is on the road now! And allthough there are several thing to improve, i am very happy with the result (and the optential).

Hello Bart.. and hello Mrs. Maztra And welcome to the site Hats of... That is an INSANELY brave conversion!! ,both in terms of the work involved, AND considering the wankels less then stellar reputation regarding reliability.

Three cheers from here though, for making it work.. AWESOME!

LENNART ! get this one in the gallery !!

Ps: What kind of power do you get from this rotary engine?.. as far as i recall the early type rx-7 didn't put out more then the pug 8v gti?

Hi Bart, good to have you on the forum. A big cheer from here on the successful conversion. You have done a magnificent job. It is an impressive engine room indeed. I am also very impressed with the gearbox conversion, it must have been challenging!

Are you still running your Megasquirt injection on the engine or is it Mazdas own engine management (digital or carburetted?). I notice the relay box you had on the Peug engine.

The peugeot engine was megasquirted, and my intention was to do the same thing with the wankel. Now it is still on its original carb, but i have lots of trouble with this carb. The engine coughs, hesitates and stalls when i floor the pedal. I know its a carb issue, but i can't find the cause. Convert it to fuel injection is a big project and i don't want to do this now. First i want to solve other more important stuff like renew brakelines, suspension.

Alltough the carb is not right, the car is driveable. 2500 kilometers since 2 months. Now i am busy to get hold of an other carb. I have ordered a manifold for a single weber 45dcoe. Or dellorto 45DHLA or mikuni 44PHH or solex 44ADHHE. I prefer the dellorto or the mikuni. I probably can get one next week

Woooow! Wankel engine in Murena! Well, as I don't like conversions on Matra, I like this! I really am fascinated by that what everything is possible to input into the Murena

Michal

I am shocked.

So, you took such great offence at my suggestion of an Alfa V6 but like a Japanese copy of an NSU engine in a murena

Personally I think it is always worth a try to find a better engine (after all Matra didn't make any of them) so good on you Bart. I would always worry about the oil consumption on a Wankel and when they do go wrong you will have to take it all out again.

......a Japanese copy of an NSU engine in a murena I would always worry about the oil consumption on a Wankel and when they do go wrong you will have to take it all out again.

Well, the japanese didn't just copied the nsu engine. It was a licenced build. But the japanese improved the design and sort out all the weak points. The nsu engine was bad and not ready for mass production. And that's where the wankel gets its bad name from. The japanese version is good and relaible and you get get a lifespan of 200.000 km before it is time for overhaul. Yes, there is oilconsumption. But not due to bad seals or bad tolerance. Like a two-stroke it needs oil to lubricate the rotor. And mazda is using oil from the sump for that. So you have to top it up once every while.

It is a pity that everyone thinks a rotary is a bad engine. Autojournalist allways likes to refer to nsu engines. It was bad back in the nsu days, but time has moved on.. (it would be the same thing if i say that skoda is crap ) Mazda is still producing the rotary engine (RX8) and last year it won the "engine of the year" award.

I've seen quite a few early Mazda wankels in Australian tuning magazins.... and the power they get from them surely proves that the Japanese MUST have made some improvements to the design.I find Wankels very fascinating... and highly exotic (obviously), but worry that Mazda even today, haven't solved the issue of its high fuel consumption.

So, you took such great offence at my suggestion of an Alfa V6 but like a Japanese copy of an NSU engine in a murena

David

well, I am sorry, Alfa or Peugeot conversion is just changing another "normal" engine to something not original, but wankel engine in Murena is something totally mad and absolutelly exotic! Of course that I will NEVER do this to my Matra (I'll rather be the last one on the circuit, but when I show my engine to somebody, I'm showing what Matra really built in early 80ties, and everybody understand to that, not something like - we say - catdog), but it is imposant to see it. It is like V8 engine in motorbike

I really hate Skoda cars. Last good Skoda was... they never built good car but old Octavia from 60ties was not bad. Than they stoped themselves on rear-engined cars till the end of 80ties and than Favorit and Felicia was something terrible. New Octavia and Fabia is from 99,9% Volkswagen, so we aren't speaking about Skoda cars. I understand, that when there were comunists, Skoda engineers was not allowed to produce better car than Russians. There were lot of beautifull projects, but it was forbiden to produce them. But the result is... that Skoda made bad cars. Now the technology is German, design is made by German hands, and in the factory there are working Ukrainian and Slovak people, so what is there Czech? Beer in their stomaches... And what I absolutely don't like are people who are making tuning on Skoda. But man, be sure that it is tuning from Your worse dreams! I will search some pics...

Skoda with Porsche engine? Selfkiller... When Skoda made crashtests in 70ties, front part was totally broken and front bonnet was stoped by wiper arms... but they said: right, good! And the car was produced. Lot of people was killed by bonnet cut their heads... Skoda - simply never!